Fernando Alonso has been reflecting on Adrian Newey\u2019s input after taking the designer\u2019s debut Aston Martin car for its first laps during the Barcelona Shakedown, with the Spaniard admitting that Newey is \u201calways teaching us something\u201d.<\/p>\n
While many teams started their programmes earlier in the week during the five-day event \u2013 with each squad permitted to run on three out of the five days \u2013 Aston Martin<\/a> announced early on that they intended to run on Thursday and Friday.<\/p>\n It was during the latter half of Thursday afternoon that the British outfit sent the AMR26 out on track for its maiden laps with Lance Stroll<\/a> at the wheel, before Alonso<\/a> gained further mileage on Friday.<\/p>\n Sharing his initial thoughts on how the shakedown had gone for Aston Martin after jumping out of the car, Alonso said: \u201cIt was good. Definitely excited to be back in the car after the winter, and for us it\u2019s the first day.<\/p>\n \u201cI know some other teams did filming days or shakedowns at the beginning of January and then the whole week here in Barcelona, but for us it was really the very first days, so I think we had a positive one, 60+ laps and the car is responding well. First day, and more to come.\u201d<\/p>\n As well as the introduction of new technical regulations in 2026<\/a>, the season ahead also marks some big changes for Aston Martin, with the car being the first designed by Newey<\/a> \u2013 who will also act as Team Principal going forward \u2013 while it is also the debut campaign of the squad\u2019s partnership with Honda<\/a>.<\/p>\n With all of that in mind, Alonso was quizzed on how special it felt to take the AMR26 out for the first time, to which the two-time World Champion smiled: \u201cIt was very special, yesterday with Lance and today with me in the car, it was special for us \u2013 the first car made by Adrian and together with Honda and Aramco and these new rules.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd especially the last two weeks has been very, very intense, the factory trying to have the car ready and we just made it to Barcelona in the last two days. A tremendous effort from everyone \u2013 I think it was phenomenal, the last 48 hours, and thanks to everyone in the team here, at the factory, and looking forward to Bahrain<\/a> now.\u201d<\/p>\n Alonso went on to share an insight into the impact that Newey\u2019s presence has had on the team since his arrival earlier last year.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone is super motivated when we see him in the garage taking care of all the details,\u201d the Spanish driver explained.<\/p>\n \u201cI see all the mechanics, the faces, everyone is looking at him, trying to spot something that maybe he comments about the car or he wants to improve. He\u2019s teaching us always something.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fernando Alonso has been reflecting on Adrian Newey\u2019s input after taking the designer\u2019s debut Aston Martin car for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":270111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-270110","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}